


poisoned

by littlemiss_m



Series: Whumptober 2018 [5]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Assassination Attempt(s), Health problems, Near Death Experiences, No Character Death, Poisoning, Seizures, Valentine's Day, Whumptober 2018, giving up on hope
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-07-25 13:22:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16198370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlemiss_m/pseuds/littlemiss_m
Summary: Early on their second year of high school, Prompto and Noctis exchanged lockers. The assassin trying to murder Noctis with a piece of poisoned chocolate is not aware of the fact.





	1. poisoned

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Whumptober Day 5, "poisoned."

The odds of it happening were so low they might as well have been in the negative, yet it happened all the same. The first mistake was that the assailant made it all the way to the school grounds on the most popular day of the entire school year. Dressed in the regular high school uniform, they were neither spotted nor stopped by anyone, lost in the crowds of several hundred students all huddled together in the hallways. If someone saw them slipping a package into one of the lockers, then, well – it was Shiva's Day, and handing out gifts was _exactly_ the sort of a thing people did on Shiva's Day.

The second mistake was in the lockers themselves. Very early in the shool year, when the staff had printed out lists of locker numbers assigned to the students of their classes, Noctis and Prompto had realized that theirs were not only in different buildings, but also in extremely cumbersome locations considering their classes. Noctis, who took several AP classes in subjects dictated by his name – history, government studies, and so on – spent most of his days on the new extension where Prompto's locker was situated. Prompto, on the other hand, had his near-daily maths classes in the old wing, where Noctis' locker was. So, after a couple weeks of running around the campus like headless chicken, they realized there was a solution to the problem: switching lockers.

The thing was, there was no official paperwork for such a thing. When they asked the staff about it, they were given permission as soon as the explanation was out in the open, and so they carried their belongins from one building to the other and made sure to exhange the keys as well. They were no longer in danger of being late to class on a daily – if not hourly – basis, and so they never paused to think about what they'd just done.

Of course, _Prompto_ had no reason to doubt their solution; after all, he'd been in Noctis' life for one meager year, and had barely had his security clearance updated to allow him in Noctis' apartment. _Noctis_ , on the other hand, should have known better, should have realized the possibility of someone targeting him at school, but – the odds of something like that happening were so low, weren't they? The idea that something like this might happen did not so much as pass through his mind, not until it was Shiva's Day and the mistake had already occurred.

* * *

”Noct! Noct-Noct-Noct-Noct!”

Huffing a laugh, Noctis stuffed the massive pile of chocolates back into his locker and forced the door shut before any could spill on the floor. When he turned his head in the direction of Prompto's shout, he saw the blond running towards him at full speed, his hands clutched behind his back and a truly excited grin on his face. They wouldn't have a shared class till after lunch, but on Tuesday mornings, right after the first period, their paths almost always crossed here, in front of Noctis' locker.

”Noctis! Look what I have!” Prompto yelled at him, making his way through groups of students rolling their eyes as they stepped aside. ”I got a chocolate!”

Indeed; when he brought his hands to his front, he was holding an expensive-looking box, covered in red velvet and tied with a golden bow threatening to slip off the rounded edges of the heart-shaped container. Within seconds, a smile bloomed on Noctis' face. Though he hardly cared for the chocolates people insisted on shoving at him – he wasn't allowed to eat them, anyways, so they just went to the trash after he finished signing the thank-you notes – Prompto was a different matter alltogether. The previous year, he hadn't received a single chocolate or even a card, and hard as he tried to cover up his upset, Noctis had seen through him in instant.

That was the exact reason he'd asked Ignis for his best chocolate cake to split four ways, and very likely also the exact reason Ignis had agreed to it.

”Good job, buddy!” Noctis grinned, bringing his hand up for a high-five. Prompto flushed, clearly embarrassed under the thick layers of excitement, but returned the slap with a loud whoop of joy.

”I can't believe it!” Prompto cooed, clutching the chocolate box to his chest. ”I'm not gonna be able to concentrate at all! I'm gonna get detention because someone actually likes me!”

Ignoring the small stab of pain at his heart – Prompto deserved all the love in the world – Noctis laughed, threw his head back. They wouldn't have much longer before they'd have to split for their respective classes, but he clasped Prompto's shoulder all the same, jostling him playfully. ”Look at you go, dude,” he teased, grinning ear-to-ear, ”maybe next year this time, you might even be dating someone!”

”No!” Prompto gasped, eyes twinkling mirth. ”That'd be too cool! I'd die!”

”No kidding?” Noctis cackled. He glanced at the clock and hoisted his bag over his shoulder. ”Who's it from? Does it say?”

Prompto shook his head and turned the box over a couple times. ”Nah, there wasn't a name on the card, just, uhh, just – you know, it's a 'from a secret admirer' thing, nothing – nothing more.” His explanation was a mess of stuttered words barely audible at times and Noctis couldn't resist bumping his knuckles against his shoulder. ”Ow, that hurt, you asshole – ugh, and we've gotta get going, too, but–”

”See you at lunch,” Noctis cut in, nodding. ”Got it. Don't spoil your appetite _too much_ , dummy.”

Mock-gasping, Prompto threw himself backwards a step. ”Just for that!” he cried out, pulling off the golden bow; for a second, he looked ready to toss it into the air, but soon he stuffed it into his pocket with a shamed expression. ”Just for that, I will eat them all and leave you none!”

Noctis twisted his fight fist over his his eye, pretending to rub off tears even as he was laughing harder than in days. A split-second and one-handed finger gun later, Prompto was on his way, bouncing towards the stairs leading to his literature class, and with a deep sigh Noctis began the arduous task of dragging himself to his own classroom. All joy slipped away from his as he recalled the pop quiz the teacher would definitely try to surprise them with – every second Tuesday, always, without a fail – and how little he cared for the novel they'd been reading lately. It was one of Gladio's favorites, and though Noctis knew Gladio was what one might call a literature connoisseur, he'd almost fallen asleep trying to decipher the archaic words and turns of phrase, never mind the mind-numbling series of conversations the author wanted to call the ”plot.”

Noctis made his way up the stairs and halfway through the hallway before stopping, something new and urgent nagging at him. At first, he couldn't decipher where the anxiety was coming, but soon the little crumbs began to lead him down the right path, and all of sudden, he was wondering if someone in this school would actually leave Prompto a Shiva's Day gift. His worst bullies had left him mostly alone after Noctis staked his claim – as Gladio liked to call it – but that didn't mean that the rich, all-Lucian nobles still approved of the little blond Niff who first got into the school because of his good grades, and then took a second step up the ladder by doing what no-one else had succeeded at by befriending the prince.

Still, there were hundreds of students in the school, and thus no way for Noctis to know them all. It was entirely possible that someone had taken a liking to Prompto, or that a particularly kind soul had seen him go unnoticed by Noctis' side, but still, still – Noctis couldn't stop the pure anxiety troubling him. The odds of something bad happening weren't as high as the Crownsguard liked to think they were, but still – Noctis couldn't get rid of the chant of _what-ifs_ in his head.

”Time to get to class, Your Highness,” a teacher quipped at him, marching past with heels clacking on the tiled floors. Noctis waved a hand at her, muttered a distracted 'yeah, yeah' while remaining still.

The Crownsguard did regular sweeps of the school grounds, roughly once a month, focusing especially in the areas Noctis frequented the most. They always checked not only his locker, but the ones around it, and the first sweep after the locker exchange, they'd gone through Prompto's things because no-one had updated them on the change. There was a chance the chocolate had been meant for Noctis, instead, but he doubted there was a single person in the school who didn't know where his locker was, and – it was just wrong, somehow, and Noctis didn't want to act on a gut feeling but he couldn't help the anxiety balling together into something resembling paranoia, and–

”Mr. Caelum!” the teacher called at him, now shouting from the other end of the hallway. ”Off to class with you! You're already late, Your Highness, you must hur–”

The odds of something being wrong were so low they had to have been in the negative. Noctis knew this, but still he dashed forward, running past the last students and a handful of teachers all yelling after him, but he couldn't stop, had to make sure Prompto was okay. There was nothing wrong, he told himself, swiping sweat from his forehead; there was nothing wrong, nothing wrong at all, absolutely nothing wrong at all because someone leaving a piece of poisoned chocolate in the wrong locker just wasn't something that happened, but he was the goddamn prince of this stupid fucking country and–

–and Prompto was standing at the top of a staircase, hand pressed just below his throat, two seniors approaching him with worried expressions. Noctis halted near the foot of the stairs, panted for breath even as his brain tried to get caught up with the situation, with the terrified expression on Prompto's face, the way he was clearly struggling to breathe, the way he was falling down the stairs–

–Screams echoed in the hallway as Noctis summoned his sword and tossed it in Prompto's direction, catching him before he could tumble too far down. The two seniors stood at the top of the staircase, and the handful of students on the stairs had either flinched away from Prompto in self-preservation – the flight instinct, Noctis knew, but he was raging and terrified and couldn't be reasoned with, not yet – or tried to catch him without success. Hands and legs wrapped around Prompto, Noctis was able to take the worst of the hits, grimacing every time his body smacked against the cold granite of the stairs, but soon they rolled to a halt.

Prompto's lips were already turning blue. Noctis pulled off the emergency trigger on his watch and turned Prompto around, held his upper body up with one arm while pushing the fingers of his other hand into Prompto's mouth, feeling around for any chunks of leftover chocolate. When he found none, he retracted his hand, only to shove two fingers down Prompto's throat a second later.

There was puke on his knees. It smelled awful and the people around them gagged, confused, some of them yelling for teachers and staff, but Noctis ignored them, forcing more bile out of Prompto's stomach until nothing would come out anymore. The puke was largely brown in color, like melted chocolate, but the terrified look in Prompto's eyes – now wide and glassy, flicking this way and that – and the way he clutched at his chest told Noctis the worst wasn't yet over.

Then, Prompto began to convulse, and Noctis did the only thing he could think off: pulled a Stop cast from his Armiger and crushed it against Prompto's chest, freezing him and several other students around them solid.

The cast had a time limit of fifteen minutes. By then, the Crownsguard would be there with their doctors and anti-venoms, equipped to deal with every kind of harm that might have befallen Noctis.

He could only hope they were enough.


	2. bedridden

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know... I'm late. I had every intent to write every prompt and to post them on the day of, but then I managed to burn myself out pretty darn spectacularly by day six, at which point I decided to stop for the time being. I'm doing better now though there's no hope of me being able to get caught before Whumptober officially ends, so I'm just gonna make a goal out of finishing and posting all these (and the Kinktober) pieces before October next year. Updates will be sporadic at best, especially with NaNoWriMo coming up in less than two weeks, but I will be doing my best because this prompt challenge is something I actually love <3
> 
> Anyways, a word for this chapter. I am not a doctor and the research I did for this piece was minimal at best - spending hours of research on a fic as short as this one simply wasn't a possibility, sorry - so please don't quote me on this lol. Also, I'll update the tags in a few seconds after posting this, so make sure to check those out as well :)
> 
> That said, please enjoy reading <3 
> 
> This chapter is written for Whumptober day 16, bedridden.

They found the assailants – plural, unfortunately – before Prompto woke up. In any other situation, Noctis would have been in awe of the swift speed at which the Crownsguard worked to unveil the assassination plot, but when hours turned into days turned into two weeks, it was getting harder and harder to accept that some things simply needed time. _Everything_ was hard, these days, when he was expected to attend tutoring sessions instead of school, when his daily visits to Prompto's room consisted of him sitting in a chair awkward as a garula in a porcelain store, when the daily updates from the doctors stagnated to a status quo no-one wanted to hear... It was a miracle that Noctis was still as functional as he was, but between Ignis and the anger in his veins, he'd come to understand there was little else he could be.

At first, when Prompto had been hurried to the Citadel while Noctis waited behind, the doctors had been tight-lipped around him, only giving out the most generic explanations while the staff did their best to get in contact with Prompto's parent. ”Not dead,” was all they'd been able to say during those first two or three days, when no-one had known what was going on, and then as it became clear that Prompto's parents hadn't been very parent-like at all in the past years, the doctors kept to the same, short words because there nothing else to say. ”Not dead,” they said, not verbalizing the implied 'but,' ”not dead” over and over again until one day, ”not dead and not in imminent danger of dying,” and then, finally, ”capable of breathing on his own.”

That was the kicker: by the time the medics and doctors had succeeded at neutralizing most of the poison, the substance had already done its job by wrecking Prompto's nervous system. According to Ignis – because no-one else would repeat the words to Noctis directly – the antidotes and potions worked only at roughly 80% efficiency, and though most of the poison was out of Prompto's bloodstream within the first 24 hours, it's effects still remained.

”But what does that _mean_?” Noctis asked Ignis that night, eyes red and bleary after four nights of restless sleep, frustration seeping into his voice as he strained to understand all the medical terms and their implications. ”What does – the poison's gone, isn't that good?”

Ignis pinched his lips together and remained silent for a very long while. ”They're worried about the possibilities of permanent damage to his organs,” he explained eventually, clutching the edge of the dinner table with white hands, ”his stomach was badly burned from the poison, though the potions worked on that – at least – and the doctors believe the rest will heal over time. But...”

He stopped. Noctis felt like punching something, the terrific, never-ending dread in his guts deepening further as he leaned forward and begged Ignis to finish the sentence.

”...his lungs aren't yet capable of supporting him,” Ignis eventually continued. He wouldn't meet Noctis eyes, didn't respond to the shocked whine Noctis couldn't stop. ”Even if he were to wake up–”

”What the fuck Ignis, of course he's going to wake up–”

” _Even if he were to wake up_ , there would still be the matter of his lungs to consider, that he might require assistance for the rest of his life if his lungs won't recover well enough, and then there's his brain and the possibility of it being damaged as well, he was without oxygen for several minutes, Noctis, even with our advanced healing technology that is still something – something – something he might not recover from–”

The last of Ignis' words dissolved into thin air as his entire face srunched up into a soundless sob. Shocked to silence, Noctis watched Ignis crumble.

* * *

On day nine, the Crownsguard announced that they had named and located at least some parts of the cell behind the assassination attempt. Minutes into day ten, a hand-picked team consisting of both Crownsguards and some Glaives left Insomnia, and when the first half of the team returned before the midnight of the same day, they had detained three people.

Noctis watched the cars arrive at the Citadel. He couldn't see into them, lost contact the second the cars drove into one of the many underground garages, but even as Ignis entered the room to give him the verbal confirmation of what he'd just witnessed, he found himself unable to care.

Arresting the people behind the poisoning would do absolutely nothing for Prompto, who still slumbered in the medical wing. The arrest wouldn't wake up him, _nor_ would it bring in his parents who still hadn't answered to any of the numerous attempts at contacting them, _nor_ would it undo everything that had happened.

”We should leave now, if you wish to make it to your appointment on time,” Ignis told him, mere moments after telling Noctis about the arrests. ”Shall we, then?”

Noctis scoffed but didn't try to drag his feet; if he refused to leave his rooms, then Ignis would simply call his therapist over.

”If he _still_ tries to prepare me for Prompto dying, I swear to the Six, Ignis, I'm gonna break his nose,” he murmured angrily as he stepped out of his rooms and into the hallway. The two Crownsguards watching his door looked away from him. ”I'm not gonna listen to that kinda shit from anyone.”

Ignis hummed, refusing to look up from his calendar app. ”Then I suppose we'd better make sure there are potions at hand,” he quipped. Despite his joking words, there was no mirth in his tone – just the emptiness of someone who'd already given up – and Noctis didn't hesitate before kicking at his shins.

* * *

On day fifteen, Noctis woke up to Ignis cooking Altissian toasts in the small kitchenette. The smell was what got to him first, cinnamon and sugar and frying butter all mixing together into a scent sweeter than life, and at first, Noctis simply rolled over, content to sleep a little longer. Then, as his brain finally caught up with his body's wakefulness, his eyes shot open in fear, his heart skipping a beat before accelerating into a rhythm so fast he felt like passing out.

The clock on his nightstand read 10:34 in the morning. He should've been up three hours earlier yet here he was, still in bed, cozy and warm and suddenly reeling, because why would Ignis let him do this, why would his tutors allow him to skip lectures, why would any of this happen if something worse hadn't happened first–

Noctis dashed to the kitchen. Like he'd assumed, Ignis stood at the stove, an apron around his waist and slices of golden brown bread crisping on the pan, jam and berries and whipped cream sitting on the table, where Gladio already waited.

”What's happened,” Noctis rushed out, the words pouring out just as his eyes caught on the small smile on Gladio's face. ”What's goin on–”

He was pleading, desperate to know which of the two events they'd reached, but when Ignis turned, he, too, was smiling feebly. ”Prompto woke up for a bit last night,” he murmured, voice whisper-thin. ”The doctors cannot say much else, yet, but...”

”He's up,” Noctis repeated. Ignis smiled, nodded, but didn't let go of the spatula he was cluthing with two bloodless hands. ”He's up.”

”Indeed,” Ignis answered, just as Gladio grinned, a beaming smile full of hope Noctis wasn't sure they should be feeling quite yet. ”Indeed.”


	3. seizure

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a while since I last posted, and even a longer once since I last had anything resembling a reasonable posting schedule. From now on, I'll be trying to post something every Thursday (alternating between the whumptober and kinktober fills) and every other Sunday (other stuff). Thanks to all my readers who cheered me up after that burnout at the beginning of October, your support made me so happy! <3 I'm much better now & I have enough finished and almost-finished fics lined up that I should be able to keep my schedule at least for a while.

Noctis didn't notice anything wrong until after he reached the goal, his arms shooting up as he whooped in joyous excitement. On the TV screen split into two views, his character had just raced through the goal posts, massive letters bouncing on his screen congratulating him over his victory. It had been a hard battle, what with Prompto throwing each and every weapon available in his direction over and over again, but a miracle had happened on the last stretch of the yellow brick road and Noctis wasn't about to let his friend forget his mistake.

”Aww, yes!” he crowed, setting the controller down so that he could turn to face Prompto. ”Did you see that? Not so great anymore, eh, mister In–”

As soon as he saw Prompto, his mood crashed. ”Buddy?” he asked, waving his hand in front of Prompto's face but gaining no reaction. ”Prom? Can you hear me?”

There was no reaction, not that Noctis was expecting one – not when Prompto's entire body was already spasming subtly, his blinks long and absent as he gazed straight forward. Quick and careful, Noctis picked Prompto's controller from his hands before it could slip free and crash on the floor, then got up and moved the wooden table further away just in case the seizure would grow worse. That was the lesson they'd learned the very first time Prompto had a seizure at his apartment, when he'd crashed straight through the glass table, when all Noctis had been able to do was watch in horror as his best friend writhed on the floor in a pool of glass shards small as diamonds.

Now, though – when Prompto's body suddenly spasmed rigid, Noctis was ready, swiftly sticking his arms forward and catching Prompto before he could fall on the plush carpet. He retreated just as fast and started the timer on his watch, but after that, there was little he could do but wait.

The waiting was always the hardest part, he'd learned during the two years that had passed since the incident with the chocolate. Despite the odds, Prompto had proven himself far sturdier than anyone had expected, and though his recovery had been slow, he'd succeeded. He'd never be in peak condition again – not with his lungs keeping him from running the way he'd used to love so much – but he was living. He had survived and though accepting the changes had taken them all more than a little work, they were slowly beginning to understand that at the end of the day, surviving was all that mattered.

On the carpet, Prompto's body continued to jerk. Noctis glanced at his watch, nervous despite having witnessed the seizures a good three dozen times before; every time he had to wait for the seizure to end, he found himself almost paranoid over the lenght of the phase. He'd seen the graphs and knew, logically, that over the past two years the seizures had grown both shorter and less frequent, and that Prompto's overall condition was better measured by those very same graphs rather than a singular seizure, but the ticking of his watch was like the countdown to a bomb in Noctis' ears. A minute passed, then two, then ten seconds, and the next five seconds made the seizure longer than the previous one had been, but the next five seconds were the end – so Noctis thought, so he hoped, while watching Prompto's body calm down.

Two minutes and twenty seconds. It wasn't a bad one, Noctis told himself, a relieved sigh rolling off his lips as he shuffled closer to Prompto who lay still on the floor, awake but not exactly conscious yet.

”Heya, buddy,” Noctis murmured, coming to a stop when his knees brushed against Prompto's arm. He laid one arm on a trembling stomach, silently glad that Prompto hadn't wet himself, and used the other hand to brush the sweaty bangs from Prompto's forehead. ”You good?”

There wasn't much of a response, only unfocused eyes fumbling to catch sight of him, but Noctis didn't let it bother him too much as he carefully rolled Prompto onto his side, pulling his lips apart for a second so he could check his mouth for blood. There was none that he could see, so he sat back once more, keeping his hand on Prompto's side while he continued to wait. Even through the fabric under his palm, he could feel a cozy warmth radiating all the way through his hand, and that was one of the things that still continued to give Noctis hope. Two years ago, when Prompto had been stuck inside the medical wing, his hands had always been cold as ice.

A minute or so later, Prompto began to stir. He grunted and moaned under his breath, blinked his crusty eyes until they focused on the long fluff of the carpet he laid on, and a moment later Noctis finally caught his gaze. ”Hey there, buddy,” he murmured, carefully rubbing at Prompto's side. ”Feel alright?”

It took a moment, but Prompto nodded. As Noctis had expected, exhaustion was evident in every aspect of his demeanor, from the haze in his eyes to the slackness of his whitened face, from his sluggish movements to the deep sighs falling from his lips. Prompto's first attempts at words failed miserably, nothing but slurred garbage, but even as his brow furrowed in frustration he managed to roll over to his back without dislodging Noctis' hand, which he soon grasped in his own.

”Whuh,” Prompto garbled, eyes finally focusing on Noctis' face.

”You had a seizure,” Noctis explained patiently, smiling just that much brighter when Prompto dipped his chin ever so slightly. ”You feeling okay? Should I call someone?”

During the brief silence that followed, Prompto shifted all four of his limbs. ”Nah,” he murmured after a while, then sighed deeply. ”'M tired.”

Noctis nodded. He'd expected as much as soon as he saw Prompto begin to seize, and so the weary declaration didn't shock him. ”Yeah, I know, buddy,” he soothed, rubbing at Prompto's stomach. ”Do you think we can make it to bedroom if I help you up now, or do you want to wait a moment longer?”

It took another few minutes before Prompto felt good enough to sit up, and then a beat more before Noctis helped him up from the floor. Together, they made it to Noctis' bedroom where he pulled the blankets back before helping Prompto lay down on the plush mattress. He doubled back to the living area to pick up their phones, then returned to the bedroom; a wry smile tugged at his lips when he heard Prompto already snoring. When Noctis got on the bed himself, Prompto spluttered back to consciousness, too startled to stay asleep through the rocking of the mattress, though he quieted down before Noctis finished giggling into his palm.

A small smile on his lips, Noctis settled down on the bed, casting Prompto one last glance before flipping his phone over and making sure it was entirely on silent.

 **Me (3:34 p.m.)** : so prom had a seizure just now, nothing bad but letting u know  
**Cor (3:35 p.m.):** Do I need to come get him?  
**Me (3:35 p.m.):** nah were just gonna nap  
**Me (3:36 p.m.):** hes okay i swear  
**Cor (3:38 p.m.):** I understand. I will be picking him up after work nevertheless. Let me know if anything changes.  
**Me (3:38 p.m.):** k

Still smiling, Noctis set the phone aside and rolled over to this side, his left arm coming to a curl under his head almost automatically. Before him, Prompto was in deep slumber, snoring loudly with his mouth open and a bead of drool about to roll down his cheek. It was a far cry from two years before, when Prompto had been nothing but a broken teen huddled in a massive hospital bed; though time had passed, though things had changed, Noctis still couldn't cease his comparisons of then and now. Time had gilded the worst of the hurt – the fear of death, the anxious waiting, the rage when they finally caught Prompto's parents for a call that lasted one minute and seventeen seconds – but the sights still remained burned into the back of Noctis' mind, a picture book of times past.

Things were better, these days, Noctis still had to tell himself; no matter how much conviction he strained into his words, he never quite reached the point of believing himself. Prompto was finally healthy enough to continue his studies, was enjoying excercise tailored to his needs, could finally live a life happy and meaningful. He had a proper family, now, in the shape of Cor who had entered his life in a flurry of NDAs and obscure files Noctis had been denied access to – not that he'd asked for them, not after Prompto had simply shaken his head after offering the barest of explanations – and who, to the shock of them all, had actually proved a competent if somewhat awkward guardian to an equally flustered Prompto. The list of good things, better things, ran much longer than Noctis could even pretend to spell out, but still – even if he had Prompto right by his side, asleep and as alright as he'd ever be, it still lingered on the border of not enough.

Two years before, Noctis had knelt on the checkerboard tiles of their school corridor with Prompto's body frozen in time before him. It had taken six minutes for the Crownsguard to arrive, and another five before the Stop cast wore off. For those eleven minutes, Noctis had stared at his best friend's face frozen into the mask of a man suffocating to death.

Despite all the progress that had happened since, Noctis didn't think he'd ever be able to forget the sight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed it! <3 I'm @missymoth over at tumblr, come say hi :)

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it <3 Find me at tumblr as @missymoth! :)


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